1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates communication sessions and, more particularly, to a method and apparatus for providing web content in the context of a virtual environment.
2. Description of the Related Art
Virtual environments simulate actual or fantasy 3-D environments and allow for many participants to interact with each other and with constructs in the environment via remotely-located clients. One context in which a virtual environment may be used is in connection with gaming, although other uses for virtual environments are also being developed.
In a virtual environment, an actual or fantasy universe is simulated within a computer processor/memory. Multiple people may participate in the virtual environment through a computer network, such as a local area network or a wide area network such as the Internet. Each player selects an “Avatar” which is often a three-dimensional representation of a person or other object to represent them in the virtual environment. Participants send commands to a virtual environment server that controls the virtual environment to cause their Avatars to move within the virtual environment. In this way, the participants are able to cause their Avatars to interact with other Avatars and other objects in the virtual environment.
A virtual environment often takes the form of a virtual-reality three dimensional map, and may include rooms, outdoor areas, and other representations of environments commonly experienced in the physical world. The virtual environment may also include multiple objects, people, animals, robots, Avatars, robot Avatars, spatial elements, and objects/environments that allow Avatars to participate in activities. Participants establish a presence in the virtual environment via a virtual environment client on their computer, through which they can create an Avatar and then cause the Avatar to “live” within the virtual environment.
As the Avatar moves within the virtual environment, the view experienced by the Avatar changes according to where the Avatar is located within the virtual environment. The views may be displayed to the participant so that the participant controlling the Avatar may see what the Avatar is seeing. Additionally, many virtual environments enable the participant to toggle to a different point of view, such as from a vantage point outside of the Avatar, to see where the Avatar is in the virtual environment.
The participant may control the Avatar using conventional input devices, such as a computer mouse and keyboard. The inputs are sent to the virtual environment client which forwards the commands to one or more virtual environment servers that are controlling the virtual environment and providing a representation of the virtual environment to the participant via a display associated with the participant's computer.
Depending on how the virtual environment is set up, an Avatar may be able to observe the environment and optionally also interact with other Avatars, modeled objects within the virtual environment, robotic objects within the virtual environment, or the environment itself (i.e. an Avatar may be allowed to go for a swim in a lake or river in the virtual environment). In these cases, client control input may be permitted to cause changes in the modeled objects, such as moving other objects, opening doors, and so forth, which optionally may then be experienced by other Avatars within the virtual environment.
“Interaction” by an Avatar with another modeled object in a virtual environment means that the virtual environment server simulates an interaction in the modeled environment, in response to receiving client control input for the Avatar. Interactions by one Avatar with any other Avatar, object, the environment or automated or robotic Avatars may, in some cases, result in outcomes that may affect or otherwise be observed or experienced by other Avatars, objects, the environment, and automated or robotic Avatars within the virtual environment.
A virtual environment may be created for the user, but more commonly the virtual environment may be persistent, in which it continues to exist and be supported by the virtual environment server even when the user is not interacting with the virtual environment. Thus, where there is more than one user of a virtual environment, the environment may continue to evolve when a user is not logged in, such that the next time the user enters the virtual environment it may be changed from what it looked like the previous time.
Virtual environments are commonly used in on-line gaming, such as for example in online role playing games where users assume the role of a character and take control over most of that character's actions. In addition to games, virtual environments are also being used to simulate real life environments to provide an interface for users that will enable on-line education, training, shopping, business collaboration, and other types of interactions between groups of users and between businesses and users.
As Avatars encounter other Avatars within the virtual environment, the participants represented by the Avatars may elect to communicate with each other. For example, the participants may communicate with each other by typing messages to each other or an audio bridge may be established to enable the participants to talk with each other.
There are times when it would be advantageous to be able to learn more about particular objects encountered in a virtual environment. Conventionally this has been done by enabling a tooltip style popup to be used to present additional information about particular objects in the virtual environment. For example if the Avatar came across an unknown object, by moving the mouse cursor over the object the object name or a property of the object may be shown to the user. This solution does not provide significant information about the object, and hence is of limited utility. Additionally, the information about the object may not be easily changed or updated since the information is contained within the three dimensional virtual environment and served to the user from the virtual environment server.
Another way that additional information may be made available is to provide a drop-down menu instead of a tool-tip. For example, a property browser may enable a user to view or edit a dynamic list of properties associated with a three dimensional object. However, this mechanism has significant limitations, since the available information is limited to the content of the drop down menu. Also, since the content is internal to the virtual environment, updating the content requires access to the virtual environment code.
Some systems also allow specific actions or object types to have a URL associated with them. When the user encounters an object of this nature, the user may click on the URL to have an external web browser launched in a pop-up window. Additional information about the object may then be displayed about the object in the external pop-up. Unfortunately, this solution does not enable the content that is shown in the web browser to be easily associated with a particular part of the three dimensional object. Where there are multiple URLs associated with the object, it may be difficult for the user to determine what content is associated with which aspect of the object. Particularly if each URL causes a new window to open, the user may lose track of which window is associated with particular parts of the three dimensional object.